Brother Cadfael 04: St. Peter's Fair

I do."
    "Truly," she said, shaking her head helplessly, "I understand you not at all. There is nothing else I could say to you, for I know nothing of a letter. If my uncle carried one, as you claim, he never confided in me. Do you suppose a man of business takes his womenfolk into his confidence over important matters? You're mistaken in him if you believe that."
    Corbiere came forward an idle pace or two into the room, and she saw that no trace of his limp remained. The brazier had burned into a steady, scarlet glow, the light from it reflected like the burnish of sunset along the waving gold of his hair. "So I thought," he agreed, and laughed at the memory. "It took me a long time, too long, to arrive at you, my lady. I would not have trusted a woman, no ... But Master Thomas, it seems, had other ideas. And I grant you, he had an unusual young woman to deal with. For what it's worth, I admire you. But I shall not let that stand in my way, believe me. What you hold is too precious to leave me any scruples, even if I were given to such weaknesses."
    "But I don't hold it! I can't give you what I have not in my possession. How can I convince you?" she demanded, with the first spurt of impatience and indignation, though she knew in advance that she was wasting all pretences. He knew.
    He shook his head at her, smiling. "It is not in your baggage. We've taken apart even the seams of your saddlebags. Therefore it is here, on your person. There is no other possibility. It was not on your uncle, it was neither in his barge nor in his booth. Who was left but you? You, and Euan of Shotwick, if I had somehow let a messenger slip through my guard. You, I knew, would keep, and come tamed to my hand - but for a sudden qualm I had, that you might have sent it back in Thomas's coffin for safe-keeping, but that was to overrate you, my dear, clever as you are. And Euan never received it. Who was then left, but you? Not his crew - all of them far too simple, even if he had not had orders to keep strict secrecy, as I know he had. I doubt if he told even you what was in the letter."
    It was true, she had no idea of its contents. She had simply been given it to wear and guard, as the obvious innocent who would never come under suspicion of being anyone's courier, but its importance had been impressed upon her most powerfully. Lives, her uncle had said, hung upon its safe delivery, or, failing that, its safe return to the sender. Or, in the last resort, its total destruction.
    "I am tired of telling you," she said forcefully, "that you are wrong in supposing that I know anything about it, or believe it ever existed but in your imagination. You brought me here, my lord, on the pretext of providing me the companionship of your sister, and conducting us both to Bristol. Do you intend to do as you promised?"
    He threw his head back and laughed aloud, the red glow dancing on his fine cheekbones. "You would not have come with me if there had not been a woman in the story. If you behave sensibly now you may yet meet, some day, the only sister I have. She's married to one of Ranulf's knights, and keeps me informed of what goes on in Ranulf's court. But devil a nun she'd ever have made, even if she were not already a wife. But send you safe home to Bristol - yes, that I'll do, when you've given me what I want from you. And what I will have!" he added with a snap, and his shapely, smiling lips thinned and tightened into a sword-blade.
    There was a moment, then, when she almost considered obeying him, and giving up what she had kept so obstinately through so many shocks. Fear was a reality by this time, but so was anger, all the more fierce because she was so resolutely suppressing it. He came a step towards her, his smile as narrow as a cat's bearing down on a bird, and she moved just as steadily to keep the brazier between them; that also amused him, but he had ample patience.
    "I don't understand," she said, frowning as if she had begun to feel genuine curiosity, "why you should set such store on a letter. If I had it, do you think I should refuse it to you, when I'm in your power? But why does it matter to you so much? What can there be in a mere letter?"
    "Fool girl, there can be life and death in a letter," he said condescending to her simplicity, "wealth, power, even land to be won or lost. Do you know what that single packet could be worth? To King Stephen, his kingdom entire! To me, maybe an earldom. And to a number of others, their necks!